What's Up with Tech?

From Factory Floor To Frontline: Why Mission-Critical Communications Matter

• Evan Kirstel

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What if customer communications weren’t an island, but the heartbeat of your business? We dive into how we’re unifying contact center and collaboration with an AI-powered CX platform designed for end-to-end automation, tight integrations, and real-world reliability. The goal: make every interaction faster, smarter, and easier to act on—without forcing a rip-and-replace.

We unpack why hybrid UC is accelerating w/ Martin Bitzinger
Senior Vice President, Product Management Mitel, especially for teams that need security, sovereignty, and uptime across regulated industries. You’ll hear how agentic AI moves beyond insights to orchestrate actions across CRMs, ERPs, and line-of-business apps, turning a single customer request into a streamlined, auditable workflow. We also share why devices are far from dead: as voice becomes the most natural interface for AI, better endpoints matter. That’s why we’ve invested in software differentiation for desk and cordless phones and reshored manufacturing to Germany, using AI-powered automation to boost resilience and supply chain control.

Security runs through everything we’re building. We break down the true value of software assurance—access to patches, supported releases, and new AI features that extend what you already own. On the roadmap: deeper CX features, a new low-end device for lobbies and common areas, and a growing open SIP portfolio certified across leading UCaaS platforms. We’re also advancing distributed architecture and edge compute to support hybrid deployments that keep critical functions local while tapping cloud intelligence where it fits.

If you care about frontline experiences, mission-critical communications, and practical AI that respects your constraints, this conversation is for you. Subscribe, share with a colleague who runs CX or IT, and leave a review with the one feature you want most next.

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SPEAKER_00:

Hey everyone. Really exciting update today as we dive into Mitel's product strategy and philosophy for the rest of this year. Martin, how are you?

SPEAKER_01:

Great. How about yourself?

SPEAKER_00:

Uh doing well. You guys have been so busy. I'm really intrigued for an update. Before that, maybe introduce yourself. And how would you describe Mitel these days?

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, I'm uh I'm the senior vice president for uh our product uh portfolio uh at Mitel. Um so um responsible for you know driving roadmap, driving innovation, um, and really um hoping to solve problems for our customers with our product portfolio.

SPEAKER_00:

And make it sound so simple and yet so much complexity behind the scenes. Before we dive into specific innovations, let's start with the big picture. What's Mytel's overall product and portfolio uh offering today?

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, so um this year has uh been uh a year of a bit of uh transformation, right? So we've been really trying to accelerate our innovation across our hybrid uh UC portfolio. So lots have been going on this year, um, especially with some of the macroeconomic changes um and uh some of the stuff that's uh going on in the world. There's a lot of interest in solutions that are you know more secure, more resilient uh for certain types of things. And that's where we have solutions for. That's where our solutions are a perfect fit. Um so we've been uh launching that with our common communication uh framework uh last year. Uh then we've been busy adding uh AI enhancements, um, but not sacrificing some of this deployment flexibility and really hybrid flexibility where you can deploy where and how you want and any combination of a cloud-prem, private cloud, multiple clouds. Um, and that's what really differentiates us.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, making so many waves. And talk about the portfolio specifically. What are some of the key product development areas and innovation efforts uh you've been focused on? And uh you've had a lot of announcements and news.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, there was um you know a lot uh going on. So one of our um uh biggest uh news this year was the launch of our new AI-powered uh CX solution, so a new contact center solution um that's available across our portfolio to really elevate um how customer communication is done. And what uh what sets us apart there is that we don't consider customer communication as uh as an island. And in a lot of ways, uh many companies, many competitors, the contact center is the thing off to the side, right? The people where all the support techs or whatever sit. And we just don't see it that way. We want to uh make customer communication an integral part of your everyday communication task as a as a business and really provide this end-to-end solution. And AI is really um you know um putting that into you know superdrive, uh, really, because what AI now enables you is not just to respond to customer um from an interaction perspective, but with the agentic aspect to really automate um end-to-end communication flows um that start with some sort of customer request and then go all the way through the business um in an automated or semi-automated fashion. And that's really where a lot of the innovation is, where our portfolio is a good fit and what we want to make um sure we have with our uh new CX offer. And it's not just us, um, we also uh launched up um um or partnered with LSpark, uh uh incubator um accelerator for startups. And so there's some exciting stuff uh coming out of that as well, really new ideas, all in that direction is how do we make you know um customer interactions more meaningful?

SPEAKER_00:

Fantastic. And you're a keen observer of industry trends and opportunities. Uh, what are some of the big themes that you're writing and and driving as far as innovation? Any any specific product functionality, features, releases that kind of will help you keep ahead of this wave?

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, so it's really a couple things. So naturally AI already mentioned it as uh you know it has to be part of everything, uh, but not just the insights and the analytics piece, but really the um um agentic piece as well to drive uh end-to-end um automation that can only work in conjunction with um having a really integrated open solution that can interact with all sorts of other business applications or other pieces in the business. Um, and typically what it also requires is a very narrow uh vertical focus because you really need to understand your customers' uh business um and um really understand the specific problems they have so that you're able to help them. Um and so this is um really some of the you know core innovation themes. A lot of that, as I mentioned, is focused around, of course, the CX uh and customer experience angle.

SPEAKER_00:

Fantastic. And you are doubling down on you know phones and devices, really. Uh opportunity there, which continues to grow uh in the enterprise. Let's zoom in there. What's new? What should customers, partners expect in this category?

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, hardware is um um, yeah, everybody thinks some of those hardware things like phones and all of that is going away, but it in reality there's still a strong demand and in lots of industries. Um there is uh still a continued requirement for like audio devices um and and similar types of uh device-like things. Um, we actually believe that some of the current trends um is um and specifically around AI are actually making um uh devices or audio devices, phones, um cordless stuff, etc., more relevant because uh human speech is becoming a user interface again to interact with technology, of course, helped by uh helped by AI, um, much more natural interface with that. Um and so this year has been really a year of um a transformation um with some you know really um cool stuff um we did um from a software perspective, software differentiation on our uh you know desktop phone line, on our cordless phone line, um, but also you know, some um manufacturing innovation um that we've brought to the table. Um so we um have completely transitioned our manufacturing um out of China uh and back into Germany. Um and that's been possible with um you know AI-powered uh factory automation as well, where you can basically automate um manufacturing of um more complex devices that are not like super high volume, that are not in the tens of millions, but um in the hundreds of thousands, um, to where you really automate that um with um a flexible um AI-powered manufacturing line that is much easier to train and retrain for manufacturing different types of variants of product. Um so lots of stuff going on even on the devices side, but lots of focus from customers on um also uh resiliency from that perspective, you know, um, you know, with all the discussions going on on you know, fearing that they're all of a sudden cut off from supply with some of these macroeconomic factors that are coming into play. So that's been a really busy year for us on that front.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, it's it's amazing. This industry continues to surprise. My son just started an internship at a big tech company in the Boston area, and he was so excited because he had a desk phone uh for the first time. Uh happened to be my tell, and he was like, Oh, this is uh I'm I'm stepping up in the world. Uh so he he was he was really intrigued by that.

SPEAKER_01:

I I can tell you it's like the even that thing is a status symbol in some parts of the world, that's still a thing, right? So, you know, less so in Europe and North America probably, but in some countries it's still a thing.

SPEAKER_00:

It's amazing. And so you spend a lot of your time not just on product development, but things like life cycle uh planning and software assurance. And you've done a lot of work in that area to help your customers and partners get more value over time, uh, accessing security patches and updates and AI features and more. Um, how's that rollout coming along?

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, so like the software assurance in the you know, in the old days was really just perceived as uh access to support. And this is just something we we need to continue to educate and um you know tell people about it so much more these days. Um it's security is the paramount thing in the IT industry um these days, and you really gotta watch it, um, otherwise you're taking a huge risk. Uh, we're investing a lot of money in our RD department on you know, um, you know, uh security related, um, you know, updating all the underlying stuff, uh, penetration testing, all of this stuff, reacting to vulnerabilities that are being found. But the the problem is if you never upgrade your software, um, or um like you're not gonna benefit uh from from any of that work that's being done. And software assurance is really what you know gives you access um to all of that, besides giving you access to support, uh, but it also gives you access to all the latest features and specifically with all the AI components and connecting that to our cloud offers. Um, it's really critical for people to get onto that to be able to leverage um all the latest and greatest uh in terms of technologies, in terms of analytics uh tools we have, in terms of AI-powered um uh stuff that you can uh augment your platform with. And the beautiful thing is you don't need to change everything you have uh to get access to that and to you know implement AI type features um on these platforms. All you really need is active software assurance um upgrade to a supported release or recent release, and then you know go off and start to use it. Um it's um it's it and it's a thing that's um really starting um to you know um to get into people's minds. But it's been it's been it's been difficult, I can tell you, right? Because it's the like things persist and it's like oh it's maintenance, it's it's this, it's just access to support. That kind of mindset still exists in a lot of parts of uh mini industries.

SPEAKER_00:

Indeed, a lot of reinvention needed there. So we're in Q4, it's hard to believe. Uh, but you know, now is when a lot of enterprises are spending their budgets on IT and telecom and and networking. Uh, what should customers, partners look forward to from MITEL the rest of the year?

SPEAKER_01:

Um, so there is um really um some you know meaningful uh releases um that are coming um out uh later this year. So there is lots more content coming on our CX uh uh portfolio. Um that is of course extending into next year. Lots of innovation, lots of new stuff um happening there. Um we're launching a new uh low-end device um uh that is um of course attractive um for you know lobby type phone um uh um use cases. Um, you know, really attractive price point uh on that, really attractive quality of uh of the of the product. Um we're also doubling down on our open SIP portfolio. So we're you know, um we just launched um and we're still launching in some countries our phones, our phone hardware, not just on our own platform, but on you know, pretty much any UCAS platform out there that you can uh you can think of. Um so that that's really something um we're we're trying to drive home to be really become um a player and take advantage of some of these macroeconomic factors where some customers may not be comfortable um with each, for example, some Chinese vendors, some you know, customers even stricter, they cannot use it for all sorts of reasons, regulatory reasons being the most dominant. Um so that's really uh something we're we're focused on. Um there is a a bunch of platform releases um that improve like um you know the distributed architecture, edge compute type hybrid um uh feature set there. Um so lots coming there. Um, but you know, most and you know, most importantly, we're really doubling down on our commitment to customers. On, you know, we're here um to grow with you. We're here to you know give you the tools, the new releases, the features, and the seamless path to some of these new things uh that you need to have in your communication environment, uh, whether it's AI-based, um uh customer experience based, contact center-based, or whether it's specific vertical solutions. Um, so we're building into that also with a strong roadmap that we already started to communicate to our customers um in early 26.

SPEAKER_00:

Fantastic. Well, you've been so busy. They say it's a marathon, not a sprint, but it seems like you've been like sprinting a marathon over the past uh couple of years. Any final reflections or thoughts uh to end this up?

SPEAKER_01:

Well, um, you know, we'll we'll see what next year brings. Um, like going into this year, some of the topics we did not have uh on our radar, and we had to kind of adjust and uh and course correct. And uh so it's it continues to surprise um even the the experts in the industry with uh the speed of some of these things that are involving. We we fundamentally believe um that there is you know uh a strong uh need for you know frontline experiences, really improving things for the frontline worker, not the knowledge worker at their desk. That's what a lot of focus has been on in our industry. So that's one of the key things we want to uh continue to innovate and go into next year with um the customer experience, a custom communication angle, contact centers, etc. That that will continue. And then I think the the whole piece of like mission critical uh communications um and uh resiliency, sovereignty, um, that's gonna uh be there um into next year as well. And that is a strong, of course, driver for the the hybrid UC type solutions that we um that that we're offering.

SPEAKER_00:

Well, fantastic update. Congratulations on all of the success, onwards and upwards. Thanks for joining us.

SPEAKER_01:

Thank you.

SPEAKER_00:

And thanks everyone for listening and watching, sharing this episode. Also, check out our TV show at techimpact.tv, known Bloomberg and Fox Business. Thanks, Martin. Thanks everyone.